The present invention relates to a user interface, in particular, to a technique of immediate presentation to an operator of the concurrence capability of features in a machine as well as immediate presentation of those features in use, available, and not available for a given machine.
To meet modern document needs, document systems have been provided with ever expanding feature sets for various local and remote applications such as document copy, document distribution, document storage, and document printing. In the past, to expand feature sets, existing control panels were usually augmented with more menu layers, an increased number of categories of features, and increased numbers of buttons and icons. As a result, end user operators are often confronted with a control panel search task in order to locate and access the particular set of features and electronic dialogs needed for a particular job.
This has only aggravated job set up complexity for operators. The problem is further intensified when multi-functional features such as fax, print, store, and distribute are required. In these situations, users and operators are often confused on the availability of features and proper selection and combination of features to achieve a given job objective.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,450,571, assigned to the same assignee as the present invention, discloses a dialog filtering process for a printing system to filter out non-selectable print programming selections. U.S. Pat. No. 5,513,126, assigned to the same assignee as the present invention, discloses a network having selectively accessible recipient prioritized communication channel profiles. In particular, a sender can automatically distribute information to a receiver on a network using devices and communication channels defined in a receiver profile. In addition, U.S. Ser. No. 08/329,811 (D/94101) filed Oct. 27, 1994 , now U.S. Pat. No. 5,604,860, discloses a method of customizing and storing an interface control for a machine by entering an interface control customizing mode. This provides access to a library of control features for selecting a set of control features for use on a given machine and for arranging the set of control features in a given configuration on a scaled representation of an interface control. The set of control features and given configuration are referenced with a given identifier whereby upon accessing the identifier the set of control features and given configuration are provided on the interface control display. U.S. Ser. No. 08/541,547 (D/95418) filed Oct. 10, 1995 , now abandoned, discloses a method a using customized interface control panels.
A difficulty with the aforementioned systems, however, is that they are relatively complicated. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 5,450,571, deals with print queues and providing common electronic job tickets with inter-client protocol and client-server protocol formats including providing printer user interface mask files for each printer. Or they deal with set up, storing and retrieving of customized control panels as disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,513,126 are concerned with communication channel profiles for sending and receiving information over a network.
A further difficulty is that prior art systems do not account for and simplify for the operator the high degree of automation, networking, interdependency, remote operation, concurrency, faxing, scanning, printing, and traditional copier functionality of existing machines. It would be desirable, therefore, to present to the user an immediate indication of the status and capability of a given machine. That is, it would be desirable to give the operator an immediate and easily recognizable indication of the ability of the machine for concurrent operation of features as well as the current use and capability of network connection.
It is an object of the present invention, therefore, to provide a new and improved user interface that mimics machine activities as the activities occur and provides timing information, functional sequences, and capabilities of a given machine in its network environment. It is still another object of the present invention to immediately present to an operator the concurrence capability of features in a machine as well as immediate presentation of those features in use, available, and not available for a given machine. Other advantages of the present invention will become apparent as the following description proceeds, and the features characterizing the invention will be pointed out with particularity in the claims annexed to and forming a part of this specification.